Review by Ian Keogh

Antoine Revoy is a big fan of Japanese horror comics, and the atmosphere generated by superior exponents of the genre drips from the prologue to The Harrowing Game, which explains the title. A person awakens in a strange house and makes their way to the bathroom where they’re confronted with two people, one in the bath and the other in the mirror above it. It’s explained that only one of them will leave the room, and who depends on which of them tells the most horrific story. It’s the framing device for the three stories that follow.

There’s what proves to be an unnecessary precision applied to setting the opening story in Providence, Rhode Island in 2016, taking a diversion to detail the city’s history before settling on a particular inhabitant. Blake Kim is a university lecturer who keeps a creature in his basement that will eat any living thing provided the potential victim has never eaten meat. From there we switch to Blake on a date with a vegetarian…

Is there a connection with the second story taking place in Egypt in 2016 BCE? Sekheminr is a renowned architect about to set off on a three day trip to a holy site in the desert where a new temple to Osiris he’s designed is about to be completed. It turns out, though, his great skill has a supernatural origin and there’s a price to be paid…

Finally we learn about elderly blind lady Eileen, who hears a voice promising that if she helps them out her sight can be restored. Will she believe them?

Exceptionally good art feeds into every story, Revoy adapting it to the needs of what’s being told, with artistic influences including Junji Ito and Naoki Urasawa. Clarity is paramount, but there’s also a skilled assurance of every character being identifiably different.

Each story can be taken at face value, but readers paying attention will notice there’s a common factor, and it turns out what Revoy has set up at the start needs a fourth story.

The connection is smart, but in order to play it out Revoy has to temper his imagination. The first and longest story told is considerably better than the remainder for having a greater cast, mystery and a good twist. The second and third define their lead characters well, but progress more predictably. As foretold in fact. They need to do so for the final inclusion to work in revealing more about the cast and some events, although the ending is disappointingly underplayed.

The flaws noted aren’t fatal, and the excellent art goes a long way to compensating, meaning horror fans ought to enjoy The Harrowing Game.